


and deep down i know

by twosetmeridian



Series: counterpoint [twosetviolin oneshots] [24]
Category: Twosetviolin
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Falling In Love, Feelings Realization, Friends With Benefits, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, POV Second Person, Pining, canon compliant to real life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-23
Updated: 2021-02-23
Packaged: 2021-03-13 02:47:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29644611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twosetmeridian/pseuds/twosetmeridian
Summary: In which friendship is the name of the game—until it’s not.
Relationships: Eddy Chen/Brett Yang
Series: counterpoint [twosetviolin oneshots] [24]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1560592
Comments: 6
Kudos: 64





	and deep down i know

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the discourse stemming from the Valentines-date-flowers meeting with a fan story in the _Fake Violin Playing at the Super Bowl Halftime Show!?_ video.
> 
> Title from _Stay With Me_ by Sam Smith.

You’re friends.

It’s a fact of the universe, you think. You’ve spent nearly a decade and a half together. Your orbits have coincided, your stars have aligned, you’re attached at the hip, bone to bone. He knows things about you no one else knows, tells you things he’s never told another soul. And you, you’ve never let anyone in quite as much as you’ve allowed him entry.

That’s what friends are for, this easygoing intimacy, vulnerability, and so you’re friends. You’re his friend, and it’s a good word. An apt designation.

And yet.

There’s something in your chest. It’s always been there, really, since the very start: a vibrant, lively thing that sings at the mention of his name. Here in the flesh cage of your heart, it knows its boundaries. It has learned to follow the limitations you’ve set upon it, has learned to frolic and roam within the confines of that seven-letter word. It knows its place.

You’re friends. You’re friends, but recently, you’ve been walking the thin line of those boundaries, balancing on a tightrope wall with nothing but a prayer on your lips.

You’re friends, but you’re coming to the most unsettling conclusion that this may no longer hold true.

It starts, as almost every bad decision does, with alcohol.

You’re in your bedroom at your parents’ place. The spare bedroom back at _his_ parent’s place. A hotel room in London, New York, Toronto, Vienna. An apartment in Sydney, Brisbane, Singapore, Taipei. It doesn’t really matter where you are or were; what matters is that it happened.

And it did happen. Listen: this is how it went.

In the silence of the room, someone reaches out with the intent to touch. It could be him, or it could be you, but skin and skin make contact and you feel warmth. You haven’t felt warm in a long time. Moths to a flame, as the saying goes.

Someone says “don’t.” Someone says “we can’t.” Both pleas go unheeded.

And this, well, maybe it’s just another step towards knowing the entirety of him, a study you’ve been engrossed with since that very first time he saw you struggling with an easy equation in maths tutoring and didn’t laugh.

You try not to think about it too much. It’s complicated enough at the surface level as it is.

And so it becomes a two-part ritual, conducted when the world’s cold or the night’s long or all your inhibitions are lowered by stress or exhaustion or liquid courage. You map out each other’s bodies like you’re exploring the new frontier rife with all its dangers and wonders, and at the end of it all, the word is said and parroted back.

“Friends?”

“Friends.”

It’s a circular game of telephone. A check-and-balance of confirmation. _We’re still here, aren’t we? We’re still locked in place and static where we stand, aren’t we?_

You’re friends, but with this new line drawn in the sand, you’ve pushed its borders, its limits to a near-breaking point. It won’t be long until the walls have to give.

There’s something in your chest, and it’s something new, something else altogether. It’s slow-coming, simmering at low heat in the back of your mind, in the far corner of your ribcage. At this stage of its growth, it’s largely ignored, reticent, muted. It’s unobtrusive until it’s not, making its appearance at the most inopportune of moments. It’s there when you wake up in the middle of the night and his back is to you, there when you’re touching his spine with light fingertips and wishing you could kiss down the length of it. It’s there when he plays his instrument and your eyes tear up at the music of it, there when he laughs out loud at one of your mediocre jokes and wrenches his head back and grips your shoulder for support. It’s there when you look at him in a certain light, there when you notice the play of sunshine in the depths of his eyes is one of the most beautiful phenomena you’ve ever been a witness of.

You don’t pay attention to it. You don’t _want_ to pay attention to it.

And yet.

It comes to a head one night when he’s pushing into you hard, hips snapping as he leaves hand-shaped bruises on the thighs you’ve slung over his shoulders, driving unerringly into that point inside you that makes your toes curl. His gaze is focused, his movements so single-minded in their pursuit of your ruination that the something in your chest teeters, convulses. He kisses you as the feverish tide begins to break, sharing air through the short broken gasps you make into each other’s mouths, and for a time, before, you would’ve thought _disgusting_ , but now, you can only think of how much you want to do this again. How much you want to be doing this again and again and again, ad infinitum.

You think _oh_ and you think _oh god_ and you think _please_ and _more_ and _always_ and _l—I lo—_

And no. _No_. You cannot allow this. This is the one step you cannot make. This is the one line you cannot cross. This is unacceptable, and you have to cease and desist immediately.

But you should’ve told yourself this weeks and months ago. Now, you’re finally taking a step back and seeing the mess you’ve made and you can no longer see the definitive lines that make up the whole picture. It’s too late. You’re a fucking idiot.

This is after.

He presses his face against your collarbone as you both catch your breath. The mindless press of his mouth leaves a hot brand on your skin, an imprint you know will refuse to fade for a good long while. It’s something to remember for later, something of a warm memory to pit against the cold reality of a bed of one.

You’re friends, but you’re not anymore.

There’s something in your chest, and it has outgrown the word.

“Friends?” he asks you.

“Friends,” you say, and you don’t sound like you’re lying. Small mercies, you suppose.


End file.
